To the Editor:
A recent report cited concerns of city staff that the Bayonne Board of Education was tardy in repaying monies advanced to it by the state, which must be repaid to the city, a sort of working capital loan made by the city on behalf of the BBOE. At any rate, the reporter finds that people involved are mystified.
What mystery?
The newly elected mayor, with support from newly elected city council members, crammed a retroactive pay raise for teachers down the throats of the BBOE. The amounts were unbudgeted. But who cares, right? Is this possibly an explanation? Or was the reporter afraid to go there and cast a cloud on the role of the mayor in all this? And if this is true, then the city has no one to blame but itself for irresponsibly forcing these retroactive pay raises upon the BBOE, when the city knew that there was no money in the budget.
Not a problem. That’s what tax increases are for.
Old Polish proverb: “Same poop, new flies.”
BRUCE D. KOWAL